Time After Time
by OneMaySmileAndSmile
Summary: Rodney McKay is about to go on a journey, the ultimate purpose of which seems to elude him at every turn, leaving him to wonder if he's losing his mind or meant to make something right.  McKay whump, team friendship, Cadman
1. Chapter 1

_Title_: Time After Time

_Author:_ One May Smile and Smile

_Disclaimer_: Like so many things in life, I have no claim to the fantastic characters of Stargate: Atlantis.

_Summary_: Rodney McKay is about to go on a journey, the ultimate purpose of which seems to elude him at every turn. Shifting back and forth between what he knows and what he doesn't, he must ascertain whether he's losing his mind or meant to make something right. McKay whump, team friendship, Cadman

Time After Time

Rodney McKay walked briskly down the hallway, shoulders in a familiar hunch. It was days like today that made him forget why or how much he loved his job. His own work was taxing and frustrating enough, but when his staff's incompetence forced him to do theirs as well, it made him tired... and when he was tired, he was irritable. Well, more than usual, at least.

As he turned a corner, John Sheppard walked past, and upon seeing the scientist, the soldier turned to walk along side him.

"Rodney! There you are. I've been trying to track you down for like an hour."

McKay rolled his eyes. "Did you try the radio?"

Sheppard's reply was equally patronizing. "Yeah, but when you don't have yours, that makes things kind of difficult."

When he reached up to feel for his earpiece and found it was missing, McKay ducked his head in minor embarrassment, but managed an annoyed grunt just the same.

"Details, details. What did you want anyway?"

"Teyla asked me to make sure we were still on for movie night," Sheppard replied casually, though it was apparent there was more to it.

McKay sighed in exasperation. "What? Yeah, sure. That's what you've been after me all day about?"

Sheppard grinned innocently, half-turning, preparing to make his getaway.

"Oh yeah, Cadman's coming too. See ya later."

He spun around and began to trot off. It took McKay a moment for the comment to sink in, but when it did, he stopped on a dime, eyes widening in terror.

"Hey! Wait a minute!"

McKay turned to chase after his teammate, but he was no longer in sight. With a heavy sigh, he made a sour face, wondering if the world might implode if he were to trade snarky barbs with Laura Cadman for more than thirty minutes at a time. So much for relaxing at the end of this putrid day.

He turned to continue back the way he'd been going when he came face to face with Elizabeth Weir, who gave a bemused smile when McKay nearly leapt out of his skin.

"Jesus! Elizabeth..."

"Rodney," she returned easily. "You look a bit..."

McKay slipped comfortably into egotistic hyperbole.

"Dashing?"

She smirked. "Frantic."

McKay frowned exaggeratedly. "Yes, well... they're synonyms of a sort."

With an affectionate smile, Elizabeth shook her head and patted him on the arm before continuing past him.

"Just be sure your eight hour shifts don't turn into sixteen, Rodney," she chided mildly. "You look tired."

He looked after her, his frown deepening. When she was out of sight, he puffed his chest out and forced a tiny smirk onto his face.

"Tired," he scoffed. "I'm as sprightly as a stallion."

Taking a quick look around, making sure no one had heard his declaration, McKay began to move down the hallway again, his shoulders resuming their slight hunch after only a few steps. There's some things that are just beyond a man's control.

* * *

McKay fussed with his hair in front of the mirror, doing his best to spread it around to make it look like there was more of it. It hadn't receded embarrassingly far yet, but another six or eight years and it was going to be a bleak state of affairs. He didn't know why he was taking such great cares tonight, but he was compelled to look sharp for his team's get-together. 

At the corner of the sink, a small bottle of gel stood unused. It had been something of a joke gift from Sheppard, a playful retort to McKay's constant quips about Sheppard's stylistic choices. McKay looked at it, his every natural fiber telling him to leave it there. Still, there was a reason people thought Sheppard was "cool," right?

McKay took the bottle and smeared a small helping on his hands, then ran them through his hair clumsily, spiking it up a little bit. As he rinsed his hands off afterward, he stared at his reflection, feeling a bit disgusted with himself.

"How does he do this? I look ridiculous."

If he was honest with himself, he knew what all his fussing was about. As much as he cared what Teyla thought about him, he didn't have to worry about being presentable in front of her and he sure as hell was getting prim for Sheppard or Ronan. It was a knee-jerk reaction to finding out Cadman would be in attendance. His physical attraction to her was plain and their relationship had improved considerably, but still, he couldn't get a handle on his anxious behavior. Maybe there was more there than he thought.

McKay took the long way to Teyla's quarters, doing his best to gather himself. It didn't really work, though. He still felt a bit frazzled by the time he got there.

With a hard exhale, McKay sounded the chime at Teyla's door.

When he heard her muffled voice welcome him, he took a moment to smooth down his t-shirt before the door slid open and he stepped inside.

Everyone was already there. Ronan and Cadman were seated on a small couch, Cadman's leisurewear catching his eye immediately. It wasn't anything particularly unusual or provocative, just jeans and a snug cotton tee, but something about seeing her in clothing not issued by the military was alluring enough in its own right.

Teyla was seated in a chair just past the couch, Sheppard on the floor in front of it, propped up cavalierly on one elbow. He was the first to speak, eyeing McKay with a lopsided grin.

"Evening there, Joe Cool."

McKay glowered. "What's that supposed to mean?"

Sheppard pulled himself up into a sitting position.

"Come on, Rodney, what's the deal? Khaki pants, overpriced t-shirt, spiky hair? You look like you walked out of a Land's End catalogue."

McKay's embarrassment was obvious in the mild color that found its way to his face, but as was his way, he jutted his chin out defiantly, doing his best to look unfazed.

"I don't know what you're talking about. I dress like this all the time."

Sheppard snorted. "No, you don't."

"Yes, I do."

"Do not."

"Do too!"

Teyla cleared her throat loudly and with authority, signaling an end to her friends' bickering the same way a mother might definitively quiet her sons. As always, she was kind and diplomatic.

"I think you look nice, Rodney."

McKay, momentarily shaken out of his bluster, searched for a reply, but as he wasn't used to any compliments that didn't emerge from his own mouth, he couldn't think of anything. He offered something between a smile and a grimace. He'd have sworn, though, that Cadman was regarding him with fondness.

"Yeah, Rodney. Very GQ."

Her response was casual and flippant, but McKay didn't seem to take it that way. He smiled, a rare genuine kind of smile, and just sort of stood there looking goofily content. After an uncomfortable silence, Ronan – arms crossed, eyes disinterested – finally spoke up.

"So, are we gonna watch this movie or not?"

Sheppard lifted himself off the floor and grabbed a DVD off a small end table.

"Yeah, here it is."

McKay walked carefully to the couch, then cautiously lowered himself down, very aware of his proximity to Cadman, who was regarding him with a strange fascination. He supposed, in fairness, that he _was_ behaving strangely, but it wasn't anything he could help, so he endeavored to divert her attention.

"So, what are we watching?" he asked. "If this is another Johnny Cash documentary, I'm leaving."

Sheppard rolled his eyes.

"That was _one time_, McKay, and we only watched half of it."

"Yeah, because it was four hours long!"

"Well, you can't tell his life story in ninety minutes, Rodney. He's not Manfred Mann."

McKay smirked. "Their talent's about comparable."

Sheppard's mouth parted indignantly.

"You didn't just say that."

This only fed McKay's self-satisfaction, as he cocked his head in that arrogant way of his, and let out a contented grunt. Cadman couldn't help but smile, wondering how one man could possess such pronounced insecurities and self-loathing, while simultaneously loving himself as much as McKay did. There was something almost exciting about wondering which Rodney you were going to get at any given time – the egotistical, complaining genius or the vulnerable, gentle man desperate for everyone's approval.

She spent her time pondering those things during the movie, _Radio Flyer_. McKay didn't strike her as the type to get emotionally involved in a film, but she could see subtle changes in his face, especially during the scenes of abuse. It made her wonder about his youth, something he rarely talked about. All he'd told her about was his short-lived aspiration to be a concert pianist. As she recalled, she'd laughed at him.

Teyla and Sheppard seemed reasonably invested in the movie, but Ronan had fallen asleep – no doubt from sheer boredom – and McKay eventually looked to be nodding off as well. That didn't surprise Cadman. She'd always known him to be obsessive about work and forgetful about things like sleeping, which he'd once labeled "a waste of what little time I have to share my genius with the universe." Anytime you put McKay in a dark room when his shift was over, slumber wasn't far off.

McKay could still hear the movie, but it seemed like it was getting more distant as the minutes drug on. Even with sleep encroaching, though, he was very aware of Cadman's warm body next to his. In fact, though he couldn't remember when, their legs had come to touch – not a graze, but full on thigh on thigh. He noted sleepily that she wasn't repulsed by the contact.

The voices from the movie drifted away, as did Teyla's and Sheppard's and Cadman's voices. Everything faded into darkness until nothingness was narrowed to a single point and he slipped into sleep.

* * *

He couldn't remember his bed being quite this hard, or feeling Atlantis' various vibrations this deep in his bones. And there were footsteps too... voices. Had he fallen asleep in his lab again? He wanted to open his eyes, but they felt like lead, just as the rest of his body did. 

McKay could feel a light wind blow over him and began to hear cars rushing past, sounds of the city. Not his city, though.

In what felt like a Herculean feat, the groggy scientist opened his eyes and lifted his head off of what he now recognized as a sidewalk. Various types walked past, some strolling leisurely and others in a hurry, the latter group generally wearing suits. Some looked down on him with disapproval or concern or pity, and some ignored him, but all of them kept walking.

Where was he? How did he get here? Was this all just part of some hyper-vivid dream or delusion?

McKay braced his palms on the sidewalk, slowly pushing himself up to his knees, painfully aware of the knotted muscles in his back, which cried out against his every movement. With a final, elongated grunt, he braced his hands against his legs and pulled himself to his feet, colliding with a passerby, a young teenager with a Walkman, who gave him a withering look, but said nothing as she kept walking.

"Where the hell am I?" he muttered to himself, his grogginess subsiding, but his confusion deepening.

He turned and looked into the street, at the cars streaming by. They all looked so old, like none of them post-dated 1990. He must have stood and watched twenty go by, but none broke the pattern.

Another pedestrian bumped into him, this one not satisfied with a glare.

"Hey, watch where you're going!"

It was a dark-skinned, bearded man somewhere near mid-life, with short-cropped black hair that was graying a bit around the temples. He didn't exactly look menacing, but he wasn't anyone you'd look forward to confronting either, and McKay's bewilderment and disorientation had driven all the snark right out of him. If he was awake, how did he get here? Why wasn't he in Atlantis?

"I'm... I'm sorry," he mumbled contritely. "Where am I?"

The man frowned at him, his anger obscured by his surprise at the question.

"48th and 6th."

McKay shook his head in frustration. "That – that doesn't mean anything to me. Where am I? Is this Earth? What city?"

The man's thick Brooklyn accent didn't reveal itself to McKay until he replied to the scientist's question with mocking disbelief.

"New York. And you belong at Bellevue, jack."

McKay stared at him for a few moments, his mind racing. New York? He hadn't been to New York in at least a decade, and he didn't think his memory of it was good enough to conjure up a delusion with this much detail and vitality. The city was like a single sentient being of limitless complexity and he could feel it inside his head, pounding in his skull. None of this made any sense.

After a long second, he nodded shortly at the man, his eyes full of fear.

"I think you're right."

The man couldn't think of a reply to that, and he had more important matters anyway. With one final look at McKay, he shook his head and let out a breath before continuing on his way, leaving the scientist once more to his own devices.

As McKay watched him leave, a thought suddenly occurred to him, and he looked down to see what he was wearing. Khakis and a gray t-shirt, just like his last memory from movie night. He reached up to feel his hair, still a bit mussed up with gel, though it felt messy now, like Sheppard would wear his.

"Okay, okay... think, McKay," he muttered to himself. "How did you get here? Through the Stargate? No, we haven't dialed Earth in months. Um, um, uh..." He began snapping his fingers. "Spontaneous intergalactic displacement?"

He rolled his eyes at his own idea.

"What the hell does that even mean? No, no... it's... we're still on that planet with those energy clouds. We never left. They're drawing on Sheppard's memories of New York and..." He smacked his own head in frustration. "No, no, no... that's not it."

It didn't matter how he got here right now anyway, he finally decided. It only mattered that he was here, and he needed to get in touch with Stargate Command right away. Atlantis was no doubt searching for him frantically and he couldn't rule out some kind of alien involvement in whatever forces had brought him here. He nearly groaned imagining the array of medical tests he'd have to endure when he arrived in Colorado.

McKay began to make his way down the street, weaving through the contrary foot traffic. He was pleasantly surprised that he'd not yet seen anyone talking on a cellular phone or listening to an IPod. It was quite refreshing, actually. He was all for progress and technological convenience, but they made obnoxious fools into even bigger obnoxious fools.

As he looked over his fellow sidewalk strollers, something else occurred to him. They were dressed for warm weather, and it was indeed warm out. But that didn't make a bit of sense. Januarys in New York were always freezing. That was the one thing he remembered more than any other – the deep, brutal chill that you could never shake out of your coat. But it didn't feel that way today.

Twenty feet or so away, a commuter bus slowed and then halted at a bus stop, where about fifteen people were waiting to get on. It didn't quite register with him at first – the advertisement appearing on the side of it – but it clicked eventually how out of place it was to see an advertisement for _Back to the Future_. That movie came out... must have been twenty years ago. McKay began to walk backwards as he moved past the bus, unable to take his eyes off the ad. Were they plugging the DVD or something?

Blind to what was going on behind him, McKay bumped into another pedestrian, hearing a high-pitched gasp as he collided with a young woman and knocked something out of her hands, nearly sending her sprawling to the ground. He reacted quickly, turning instinctively and finding a grip on her forearm to keep her upright.

"Oh, I'm – sorry," he said for the second time in ten minutes. "Are you all right?"

When she crouched down to pick up her purse and her newspaper, McKay squatted down next to her to help, but it was a token gesture because she quickly slung her purse back over her shoulder and deftly reclaimed her copy of the Times.

"It's fine. I'm fine," she replied kindly, smiling disarmingly as they both rose to their feet again. "You should watch where you're going, though. Most people take life a little too seriously around here."

McKay nodded, trying to return her smile, but sure his awkwardness showed.

"Yeah, I noticed that," he said. "Hey, um... do you know where I can find a pay phone around here?"

She thought a moment, then gestured across the street toward a small pizzeria.

"Sure. There's one right over there in Lombardi's," she replied, taking note of his shifty eyes. That might have concerned her other times, as she usually found it was an attribute shared by drug addicts and grifters, but something about McKay told her he was harmless. "Are you okay?"

McKay stared at her for a long moment, wishing he could convey to her just how not okay he was. Eventually, though, he just nodded.

"I'm fine, but... could I trouble you for fifty cents?"

She cocked her head and smiled strangely.

"You need to make two calls?"

He looked at her with confusion. "What?"

"Well, mister, it only takes a quarter to make a phone call," the woman said with a gentle laugh. "Unless Mayor Koch got up to something in the middle of the night."

McKay frowned, wrinkling his forehead as he added a new layer to his already profound confusion. She seemed to sense his distress, and in a gesture that should have been far too familiar for a stranger, the woman laid a hand on his arm.

"You sure you're all right?"

He didn't respond at first, trying to work things out in his head. The man was a genius, but his mind wasn't quite working at its optimal capacity right now. Still, the information was starting to coalesce...

"Can I see that?" he asked, gesturing to her newspaper.

The woman nodded, watching him with fascination as she handed it to him. McKay's face blanched, the blood in his veins growing cold. This couldn't be. His voice was gravelly, soft, terrified.

"June 8th, 1985."

* * *

AN: I'd love to hear what you guys think... what you like, what you don't... praise, suggestions, questions. Leave a review. Thanks. 


	2. Chapter 2

AN: Thanks to all who read and left feedback for the first chapter. I hope you enjoy this upcoming installment, and again, all praise, questions, concerns, and suggestions are most welcome. Thanks.

* * *

McKay's breathing hitched as the newspaper slipped out of his hands and fell back to the sidewalk. A tremor ran through his body, the kind you'd see afflict a wounded man when he went into shock. This couldn't be real. He'd been inclined to accept his predicament as authentic before, but there could be no reasonable explanation to account for his trip both through space and through time. 

The woman spoke softly to him.

"Mister, did you hit your head? Do you need to see a doctor?"

McKay felt a rush of paranoia at the suggestion. No one was going to touch him until he could figure out just what the hell was going on. If this was all the trick of some alien entity, then he couldn't trust anyone. And if by some improbable circumstance he truly had traveled back through time, he had no viable identity he could use to avoid suspicion. The Rodney McKay of 1985 was fourteen years old.

Maybe if he tracked down Jack O'Neill or Hank Landry, he could explain himself. Both men would be in their thirties, maybe early forties in Landry's case, relatively young in terms of military service. He'd yet to cultivate a rapport with either man, though, as of this year. Why would they believe him?

Of course, he could take this matter straight to the Pentagon, explain what had happened, prove himself by sharing his knowledge of the infant Stargate program. Then again, they'd probably just torture him on the premise that he'd gathered these details from a government traitor.

"No," he replied curtly, though it was anything but convincing. "I just... I need to think. I need to go somewhere and think."

On any other day, the woman would have smiled politely and bid him good day, left him to whatever quagmire had befallen him. Her every instinct right now told her to act contrary to that, though. There was something about the awkward man that had already endeared him to her. Maybe it was because he was quiet and distant and uncomfortable, when most men she met here were loud and direct and invasive.

She looked him over, then dug up another smile.

"My name's Delilah."

McKay, lost in thought, stared back at her briefly as if confused, but eventually he pulled himself out of his reverie, and as if hearing her name somehow made her real, he finally looked at her for the first time – really looked. She wasn't stunning, at least not at a glance, but she was the kind of woman you'd gloss over in a crowded room and wish you hadn't, medium length straight blond hair framing a soft face with trustworthy, benevolent eyes that looked a little bit tired, but nonetheless resolved, the barely visible lines around them a badge of courage more than a demarcation. She looked about thirty-one, maybe thirty-two, a young dreamer in the final throes of optimism.

"I'm Rodney."

"Well, it's nice to meet you, Rodney."

The more he looked at her and listened to her voice, the more he felt drawn to her in the same way she was drawn to him. It wasn't any kind of sexual attraction – though both were pleasant to look at – but rather the kind created by some collision of fate and necessity, the sort you could never hope to understand. Right now, he had no idea how he'd gotten here or how to get home, and he didn't have a solitary place in the world he could go. He suddenly felt very grateful that he'd almost knocked this woman over.

Delilah ducked her head shyly.

"Would you like to get a cup of coffee with me?"

He gave an uneasy, tentative nod in reply, then dutifully followed when she began to lead him down the sidewalk.

* * *

The cafe was crowded, but not to capacity. They found a seat easily enough, a small table over by the window. He'd forgotten what it was like to buy a cup of coffee like a normal person. Of course, _she_ was the one who paid for it, but the experience was the same. It was funny how Atlantis could open up the entire universe to him, yet make him forget it existed at the same time. The city on the water was so self-contained and McKay's focus on work so narrow that he forgot what it was like to get lost in the people back on Earth. 

"Have you ever been here?"

"No," he said. "It's nice it's not a Starbucks, though."

Delilah looked quizzical. "Starbucks?"

"Oh, it's, um... where I'm from, there's a lot of them."

"Where are you from?"

McKay smiled grimly. "A long way from here."

"I thought as much. You don't seem to be in your element." When he looked mildly offended, she amended her remark. "What I mean is, a lot of people aren't suited for this city. Sometimes I'm not even sure I am."

His expression softened. "I know that feeling."

"So, what _are _you suited for then?"

"Equations, algorithms, intricate super-advanced machinery..." he trailed off.

Delilah arched an eyebrow. "Super-advanced, huh?"

"Well, I had to put it in terms you could understand."

"Of course. A little ol' gal me can't handle any fancy words."

He frowned guiltily. "No, that – that's not what I meant..."

"I'm only joking," she said. "You're probably right anyway. I don't have much of a facility for math or science. My brother's always trying to teach me how to use his computer, but it looks too complicated."

McKay barely managed to hold back a snort at the assertion that a computer from 1985 could be complicated to use. They had, what, 5 megabytes of memory? He was conscious of being polite now, though, both because he altruistically wanted to avoid offending her and because she was about the only thing keeping him from freaking out right now.

"It's not, once you get a feel for it at least. Whenever I got a new one when I was a teenager, I used to disassemble it and put it back together before I used it."

"When you were a teenager?" she asked, unsure she'd heard him right. "I didn't know they'd been out that long."

McKay would have smacked himself in the head again if he could have. Instead, he swiftly switched topics.

"But, ah... what do you do? For a living."

"I'm a teacher."

"Grown-ups... or kids?" he asked, the last word sounding funny on his tongue.

She seemed to think so too, because she laughed

"You say it like they're plotting against me."

"Yes, well, in my experience, they are. They always want something and they don't leave you alone and they're filthy and crass and – "

"I'm going to go out on a limb here and assume you don't have any of your own."

McKay almost shivered at the thought.

"Absolutely not," he said. "Do you?"

"No. I'd like to, though."

"Well, when you have to quit your job and buy a station wagon, don't say I didn't warn you."

"I can think of worse things."

McKay grunted. "You sound just like Jeannie."

Delilah paused mid-sip, smiling inquisitively.

"Who's Jeannie?"

"She's my sister."

"Are you close?"

McKay took a long drink from his cup, looking out the window at the human heterogeneity passing by, thinking how strange it was that every person walking past had their own dreams and fears and successes and failures, and it made him sad how little he cared to know about them.

"No," he said, shaking his head. "At least not like we should be."

She looked away.

"We don't always do the things we ought to."

McKay watched her eyes swirl, like so much ash falling in the ocean. He knew then that she'd been touched by hurt and death just the same as he'd been, and somehow that knowledge slid inside one of the myriad voids in his chest.

The entrance door slamming open against the wall a few feet behind her shook out of Delilah's mind's eye whatever memory had been perched there. She looked down at her watch, starting a bit when she saw the time, and then gave McKay a forced smile.

"I have to get going. I told my father I'd go by and have lunch with him," she said, a hint of apology or regret or something of the sort in her voice. "Are you gonna be okay? I never asked what it is you're here for."

McKay let out a breath, or maybe it was a laugh. Either way, it sounded shaky and desperate.

"I'm not really sure."

A girl's scream tore through the early afternoon like a rip of wind through the doldrums. McKay's eyes followed the sound to its source. The young lady behind the counter, no older than sixteen or seventeen, stood petrified, hands in the air, as a man in a hooded sweatshirt lazily aimed a gun at her. As customers took notice of the commotion, other screams followed and so began a chaotic rush toward the cafe's single exit.

McKay watched in horror as the gunman turned and began to fire indiscriminately at the patrons as they tried to leave. Many made it out, though of them a good portion suffered bullet wounds. A few were killed instantaneously, blood and brain matter splattered over the floor and tables and chairs. Still there were others, not dead but not escaped, lying immobile with grievous wounds, their fates for the moment suspended, while their would-be murderer played out the rest of his baneful game.

Delilah's first instinct had been to rush toward the exit as well, but acting on an instinct nurtured by well over one hundred missions through the Stargate, McKay grabbed her and pulled her under the table, wrapping his body around her so that she was shielded from any and all angles the gunman might have on her.

Surveying the carnage with an unmoved snarl, the hooded man looked back at the teenager behind the counter, who stood trembling and sobbing, doing all she could to remain quiet, but utterly failing. The gunman's eyes were a shade of red, bloodshot from drugs and booze, irises hidden behind a thin film of evil.

"What's your name?" the man asked, his voice cold and even.

The girl found it difficult to talk, but managed through her tears to reply.

"Sarah."

The gunman nodded, smiling as if satisfied.

"Sarah," he said, the name sounding so vile on his tongue. "Do you believe in God?"

She didn't say anything at first, as if trying to gauge what response was more likely to spare her life. Finally, she nodded. The movement was almost imperceptible, but the gunman seemed sure he'd seen it, and he smiled again.

"Good. That's good. Do you believe in magic?"

The girl shut her eyes, shuddering uncontrollably. She had no idea what the question meant or what she could say to satisfy the man. McKay felt a barely tamed urge to stand up and bludgeon the gunman to death, but his concern for Delilah's life – and if he was honest, his own as well – was too acute, and he stayed right where he was, feeling bile rising in his throat.

With a soft sigh, the gunman shook his head in disappointment, and fired a single bullet through the girl's head, watching casually as it tore away flesh and bone and pieces of a once brilliant mind and painted the wall behind her with the blood once burning in her veins. Her lifeless body crumpled to the ground.

Try as she did not to react, Delilah began to cry hysterically into McKay's body, fitted over hers like armor. For his part, the scientist remained quiet, though he couldn't still the tremor he felt all the way down in his bones. He'd witnessed the unspeakable, but this was infinitely worse.

The gunman's footsteps felt like mild quakes as he crossed the cafe and approached their table. This would be a rather undignified way for McKay to meet his end after all the peril he'd escaped the last few years. Still, it seemed fitting for a shirker of his repute to be slain while cowering underneath a table. Delilah gripped his shirt like grim death with both of her hands, whimpering.

McKay twisted involuntarily to look at their captor when he heard the table above them overturned, exposing them in full. The gunman looked down at him, blinking cavalierly. Not in his life had McKay seen such a callous disregard for decency. There was nothing in the man's maroon eyes to indicate he had any notion of the gravity of his actions. Or maybe he did and he didn't care. Both possibilities were chilling.

"What's your name?"

McKay's shaking body betrayed him.

"Rodney."

"Rodney," the man said. "Do you believe in God?"

McKay looked away a moment. His first instinct was to reply as Sarah had, but something told him the man wouldn't be satisfied with a lie.

"No."

The gunman smiled and nodded. Delilah's tears soaked through and dampened McKay's skin.

"Good. Do you believe in magic?"

McKay stared hard into the man's eyes, searching for some sign of life, but all he found was a barren field full of promises long dead, their remnants all but washed away by the stygian deeds that lived in their stead. He'd no idea why this man did what he did or why he asked what he asked. There was just a meanness in his heart.

The scientist shook his head in the negative, fully expecting it to be his last act. With a callous smirk, the gunman took a step closer and leaned down, his face no more than a foot from McKay's.

"Then you will lose everything."

Coiling back, the gunman lifted his leg and delivered a vicious boot to McKay's skull, knocking him onto his back, his eyes rolling up in his head until he felt black collide with white.

* * *

The ground was cool beneath him, not hot as it had been earlier. It felt nice, mildly soothing his aching head, which pounded with a vigor he'd not felt since his interlude in the sunken puddle-jumper the year previous. He couldn't hear voices or footsteps or cars, but there was something familiar. There was a calm hum, a gentle vibration. Atlantis. 

McKay made several attempts to lift his head before he finally did it, and even then it was only a few inches at first. Calling on reserves of strength he'd not known he had, he pushed himself up to his knees, his body swaying, nearly toppling before he righted himself and braced one of his feet on the ground. From there, he pushed off with both hands and gracelessly stood, a wave of dizziness overwhelming him, leaving him to search blindly for the wall. He found it, and pressed his entire body up against it, letting it hold him up.

What had just happened? How did he get back here? The memory of the cafe massacre was fresh and vivid, nothing at all like a dream. He reached up and felt his head, then looked at his hand, indeed wet with blood from the wound he'd suffered from the gunman's boot. The sight of his own lifeforce smeared on his fingertips made him nauseous, and he fought the urge vomit.

On unsteady feet, without the faintest clue where he was or where he was going, McKay made his way down the empty hallway, careful never to stray away from the wall, which was the only thing that kept him upright. Each step was its own ancient epic, but he pressed on, fighting desperately against the invitation of sleep, that most beauteous of sirens.

At some point, he lost the battle to keep his drooping eyes open, but still he fended off slumber, putting one foot sloppily in front of the other as he continued on. He was so tired, so very tired. His mind even conjured up a preview of what awaited him in his sleep, a warm voice speaking to him, warm hands holding his shoulders.

"McKay," the voice said. "Rodney. Talk to me, Rodney."

No, that wasn't sleep speaking to him. It was something better. With what little will remained, McKay forced open his eyes, and through his blurred vision, he could make out the unshaven face of his best friend.

"Sheppard."

"Yeah, it's me, buddy," the soldier replied, holding his friend firmly and slowly easing him down to the ground, careful to support his head. "Easy now. Help's coming."

McKay meant to nod his understanding or to verbalize it, but he didn't have the energy and he didn't suppose it mattered anyway. He could finally rest now.

"That's it, pal," Sheppard said encouragingly, patting him on the chest. "Just hold tight. You're gonna be fine."

McKay tried to lift his head to say something, but all it amounted to was a grimace and a grunt. He gave up and shut his eyes, content to listen to Sheppard's concerned sighs and feel the man's compassionate touch. When he was nearly unconscious, Sheppard spoke again.

"Where have you been McKay?" he asked, speaking more to himself than to the scientist.

McKay heard the question, but though he'd hoped to reply more cogently, the words "movie night" were all his tongue could manage.

Sheppard frowned.

"Rodney, that was four days ago."


End file.
